State of the Warp Address
Hello, faithful readers. I've tried to make my state of the Warp address something of a tradition. A few years ago I forgot to do it and I ended up skipping from one project to the next with no real planning or completion for most of them. Think of this as a chance for you to see what I've got planned for the next year, and a chance for me to make those plans and hold myself (somewhat) accountable. I had a number of plans last year, some of which worked well and others that didn't quite make it. I'd like to mention those a bit, so you can see what I accomplished and what I didn't, then I'll go over what I'd like to achieve this year. As a note, I'd like to make better use of this list this year. To that end, I'm putting notes in here that I can refer to later to check my progress or when I need some direction for various articles.

Here are the plans I made...
Let's all jump in the Wayback Machine and see what I said last year...

Deathwing
This year I'm actually getting my Deathwing off the ground and playing them. That will be my focus for the year. Playing more often. I actually plan on playing them for the first time 2 weeks from now. (That should help me get off my duff, only 1 Terminator is actually painted. In that time, I plan on painting the rest of both squads and a character model to use as Belial. The LandRaiders are currently painted, so I'll use them as-is for the moment.

The Girls of Warpstorm!
I succeeded at the Gallery improvements. Unlike my army plans, I actually hit every target on this one. I will be adding more to the Deathwing part of the gallery this year, and I'm going to make an effort to find more variety of pictures of models. (That way if I need a picture about Space Marines, it's not necessarily going to be one of the 3 or so that I currently use.)

Self-Improvement: Tactics
Well, I did improve, but not as much as I wanted to. I did manage to write up a number of tactical articles, and you can expect to see more this year as I get more into following the way of the Water Warrior. I may also restart my tactica series about how to play, or play against, different kinds of army.

Self-Improvement: Aesthetics
As I said, my reach exceeded my grasp on the NMM effects. I got some success, but not enough to please me. I will still be attempting these, but not as a primary part of the Deathwing army. (I might try them on a character model or something.) Source lighting and blending will also have to wait for later. My first priority is getting paint on the models so that I can play. I might try some fancy stuff later, but for now I'll concentrate on painting effectively and being as precise as possible.

What about the new Tyranid Codex?
I expect I will also be distracted by the release of the new Tyranid codex, but I'm not going to sweat it. My goal is to get the Deathwing up and running. I'll be playing games with my Deathwing army while I take a look at the new Tyranid codex. While I'll definitely have to try out some new Tyranid ideas and configurations, Deathwing will be my priority for a while at least.

Note: These are not my models. It is, however,
an interesting and not-too-difficult take on a Tervigon model,
which is one of the models I'd likely want to add to my Tyranid army.

...And here is the progress that I made and what I plan for this year

Deathwing
Well, I got my Deathwing army painted up and ready to go, but then I got surprised by the release of the Dark Eldar codex. I got new codexes for 2 of the 4 armies that I play in the past year, and even the Dark Angels got an update! While that's really cool, it's defnitely kept my head spinning and distracted me from my plans! I didn't get to play the Deathwing as much as I wanted. As of this moment, I'm not sure how much that will change. I will likely only pull out the Deathwing if I don't have a workable Dark Eldar army available, at least for the better part of this year. It saddens me a little to relegate them to the shelf this year, but I know that if I don't, I'll end up doing everything in a half-assed way, and I want to do better than that.

The Girls of Warpstorm!
I've gotten a few more pictures of models that aren't part of one of my armies, but not as many as I really wanted. I need to make an effort to get down to the Tacoma GW store more often and ask people if I can take and use pictures of some of their models for my website. I also put up a pictorial update about conversions, and I'm still planning on doing one about stunning paintjobs.

Self-Improvement: Tactics
While I didn't get to play much as a Water Warrior, I believe I learned a lot more about it, and I think I managed to get a much better grasp both on tactical possibilities and on how and where to focus my improvement efforts. I'll be putting out some more information this year on that as well. I did put out some basic tactics about how to deal with and how to play as various kinds of armies (shooty, assault, hybrid) and I plan to expand that this year as well perhaps looking at some common armies, like in my old (Know your) Enemies series. Among others, look for articles dealing with: Revised and expanded 3 (now 4) levels of play, the OODA loop, limiting your opponent's options, playing on autopilot, artificial experience and knowing your opponent's moves before he makes them. I am also likely to revisit my previous articles on Efficiency, Coordination, Synergy and Winning Games.

Self-Improvement: Aesthetics
I didn't get anywhere on these plans. I've seen a new NMM style that I think will work much better for me (Thanks, Max!) but I don't know that I'll be using it much right away. I also didn't do anything with source lighting or blending, and I don't have immediate plans to do so. On the other talon, I do plan on doing a bit of (very small) freehand work on my Dark Eldar. For that matter, given that the Dark Eldar lend themselves to experimentation and oddness, I might end up working in some NMM, some Source Lighting and even some blending. I'm not willing to commit to anything other than the freehand yet, but consider this a placeholder that I hope to get back to when I have the chance.

What about the new Tyranid Codex?
Well, it did distract me a bit from Deathwing, and so did Dark Eldar. I will be getting back to the Tyranids, but I expect Dark Eldar will keep me busy and I'll be using Deathwing as my backup army for now. I believe the new codex gives the Tyranids serious potential, but they'd need more thought that I need to be putting into my Dark Eldar and they'd need more models and modeling, which are things I also need to be putting into my Dark Eldar. (Otherwise we get right back into that "half-assing" thing I was talking about. It pains me to put the Tyranids on the shelf for this year, but I think that's what I'm going to have to do if I want to get anything done.

What about Kabal Rillishelwe Mor?
Well, I (mostly) successfully put the Dark Eldar on the shelf last year, but they are coming out to play this year! The Kabal will ride again. My army is definitely a shell of it's former self. My efforts on the Dark Eldar will be focused in three directions. First: I need to catalogue, organize and modify what I have now so that I know what is available and what I can achieve with what I've got. Second: I need to plan out what I want or need to add to the list of what I've currently got and figure out the most efficient ways to get it. Third: I need to figure out a coherent paint scheme, and I'd like to include a small amount of freehand painting, possibly on each model. I don't really have a plan here yet, but I've got a few ideas. I've been thinking of using the freehand as some sort of unit marking (like on backplates or shoulder pads or helmets or something.) For the markings themselves, I'm leaning toward either a twining serpents/celtic knotwork sort of theme, or an Ouroboros (snake eating its own tail, though I'm not totally sold on these yet. I'm also not totally sold on the version of a Venom that I came up with, so I'll be taking at least one more run at modeling that.

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